LI Yiu On Systems Librarian Hong Kong Baptist University Library yoli@hkbu.hk

1. Second Annual Hong Kong INNOPAC User Group Meeting 10 December, 2001 Chinese University of Hong Kong How to use Web OPAC to facilitate selection, ordering and collection assessing functions :the HKBU Library experience LI Yiu On Systems Librarian Hong Kong Baptist University Library yoli@hkbu.edu.hk

2. Outlines I. Introduction II. Traditional Acquisitions Work Flow III. A New Automatic and Systematic Approach for New Book Selection and Ordering IV. Automatic Collection Assessing Function

3. I. Introduction

4. Our Project Aim • Routine Acquisitions Works -- review/selecting new items, checking duplicates against OPAC, keying in new records to library system • Existing Traditional Approach – manual, unorganized, repetitive data inputting • Our Aim -- to advocate a new automatic and systematic approach to replace the existing traditional manual approach

5. II. Traditional Acquisitions Work Flow

6. 3 main acquisitions process Functions Work by Selectors Reviewing / Selecting Checking duplicates Acquisitions staff Keying in new records Acquisitions staff

7. Reviewing & selecting (1) 1. Selectors • in HKBU, selectors comprised a team of 40 faculty members from various departments/programs • they are responsible to review and select items from the new title lists supplied by book vendors

8. Reviewing & selecting (2) 2. New titles lists • two major book vendors: • English books --> YBP: approval slips • Chinese books --> Man Sing (文星): Excel file • YBP approval slips are arranged by department/program fund codes • Man Sing title lists are arranged by broad subject areas • supplied monthly

9. Reviewing & selecting (3) • Problems of routing approval slips and title lists • a long routing time before returning Acquisition for ordering • some lists are missing in the process of routing • department/program based routing process is problematic and unsatisfactory when interdisciplinary titles are involved

10. Reviewing & selecting (4) • Some common questions asked in the selection process • How many books written by a author under review? • How many books in this series did the library acquired? • How many books of the same subject areas are acquired? • Where to an answer to the above questions • Check OPAC

11. Check Duplicates • Selected lists return to Acquisitions section • Before placing order, Acquisitions staff are responsible for removing duplicate items from selected by checking againstOPAC

12. Keying in New Order Records • After all duplicate items are removed, Acquisitions staff are responsible for keying in new bibliographic and order records to Innopac system (OPAC) • Data include: • bibliographic data in vendor supplied new list and; • Selector’s name, and dept fund code

13. Center of 3 main acquisitions process • If we study the 3 main acquisitions process carefully: • Selecting and review • Check duplicates • Keying in new bib and order records • we will discover that OPAC is the center of these activities • However, these 3 activities in the traditional approach are isolated and cannot establish an organic relationship among them and OPAC

14. Reviewing & Selecting Check duplicates OPAC Keying new bib & order records

15. Basic characteristics of traditional acquisitions workflow (1) • Manual • routing new title list • data entry

16. Basic characteristics of traditional acquisitions workflow (2) • Inorganic and redundant data • each process is individual and discontinued • data entered in one process cannot be used by the followed process • selectors have to key in OPAC author/title searching for collection assessment • acquisition staff have to key in bibliographic data for duplicate checking • acquisition staff have to key in selector’s name and fund in the order record

17. Disadvantages of traditional acquisitions workflow • Slow • new title list routing • manual data inputting • Repetitive data input • data inconsistencies --> inaccurate • waste manpower and time

18. III. A New Automatic and Systematic Approach to New Book Selection and Ordering

19. 3 new acquisitions process Functions Work by Online Selection From Reviewing / Selecting Checking duplicates Automatic duplicate checking program Keying in new records Automatic MARC conversion program

20. System Requirements • Software • Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP) • Microsoft Visual FoxPro • Hardware • Windows NT

21. Online Selection Form (1) • Book lists at this stage include YBP approval slip and Man Sing title list • Contains two rounds • first round by dept/program fund code posted for two weeks • unselected items go to second round for multi-disciplinary or inter-disciplinary selection

22. Online Selection Form (2) • Built-in relationship with OPAC (see Selection Critique) • A selector has the capability of checking a particular title, through HTML links, against the OPAC in the following fields: author, title, series, DDC, ISBN, and subject headings • The interface thus assists the selectors in developing a heuristic awareness of the Library’s collection

24. Automatic Duplicate Checking Program (1) • Automatically check against OPAC on two fields • ISBN • author-title keyword searching

25. Automatic Duplicate Checking Program (2) • An example: a book entitled by Art Across Time by Laurie Schneider Adams with ISBN 0072449977 • Through the ASP program, the following two links are generated: • http://hkbulib.hkbu.edu.hk/search/i?SEARCH=0072449977 • http://hkbulib.hkbu.edu.hk/search/X?SEARCH=au%3A+Laurie+Schneider+and+ti%3AArt+Across+Time+&searchscope=5&SORT=D&l=&m=&p=&b=&Da=&Db=

26. Automatic Duplicate Checking Program (3) • The ASP program will check the returned Web OPAC HTML page • Identify as non-duplicate item if the HTML page contains • “NO ENTRY FOUND” for author-title keyword searching • “NO MATCHES FOUND” for ISBN searching

29. Automatic MARC Conversion Program • Duplicate records are deleted • Selected titles are automatically converted to create MARC format bibliographic and order records and uploaded to Innopac system directly • Note: all the bib and order record data are either supplied by book vendors or keying in by the selectors

31. Basic characteristics of new acquisitions workflow • Multi-processing • printed book list can be read by one person while online selection form can be used by many people simultaneously • Organic • each process activity is inter-related and has a built-in relationship with OPAC • data entered in one process can be used by the followed process • Automatic • save manpower and time from keying in redundant data

32. IV. Automatic Collection Assessing Function

33. Reasons for Collection Assessment (1) Sun Tzu, the famous Chinese military philosopher: “So it said that if you know both the enemy and yourself, you will fight a hundred battles without danger of defeat; if you are ignorant of the enemy but only know yourselves, your chances of winning and losing are equal; if you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will certainly be defeated in every battle.” -- Art of War: Offensive Strategy, 21

34. Reasons for Collection Assessment (2) 孫子 <<謀 攻 篇 >>: “知 彼 知 已 者﹐ 百 戰 不 殆 ﹔ 不 知 彼 而 知 已﹐ 一 胜 一 負﹔ 不 知 彼﹐ 不 知 已﹐ 每 戰 必 殆﹒“

35. Reasons for Collection Assessment (3) • Sun Tzu’s principle is a rule for collection development. The question is how to put forward his principle in operation • An effective and balanced collection development policy must be build on a strategy that we can assess our library collection on a comprehensive and periodically basis • The operation of this principle in computer age is that we can design a computer program to evaluate the strength and weakness of library collection automatically and efficiently

36. Check against HKBU Library Web OPAC 1. Compare the books on logic in CUHK Library with the HKBU Library 2. Searching and downloading of titles in specific subject areas from anther Innopac library Web OPAC • LC call number = bc and published between 1989 and 1999 and language = “English” • 199 records found stored in end note format 3. Use the Automatic Assessing Function to check against the titles in the HKBU Web OPAC to determine which are included or missing from the HKBU holdings

37. Checking Another Library Web OPAC • By the same token, it allows the HKBU Library to assess its own collection strength in a particular area by outputting a file for checking against the collection of another library using Innopac Web OPAC

38. Conclusion • Our working assumptions for new book selection, ordering, and collection assessing functions: • automatic --> reduce manual input error • systematic --> data input in one process can be used by the followed process • organic --> OPACalways serves as the center of all activities • Advantages • efficient, reduce cost, accurate